Disciplining, or sleep training, or doing anything unpleasant with a breath-holder?

[Anonymous]

My 1 year old has recently developed breath holding spells, which are a kind of vaso vagal response to stress, pain, or fear, where they pass out and stop breathing for a bit. Doctors have reassured me that this is a not uncommon phenomenon, DC can't help it, isn't harmed by it, and will outgrow it. But obviously, not only are these events extremely stressful for us, but I'm worried DC will fall down and get hurt, or stop breathing too long, or who knows what else. So I try to avoid them occurring in the first place.

However. I also want to sleep train and I know in the next year or so we'll start enforcing no's, and DC will also be a toddler, so tantrums are inevitable.

Has anyone navigated this or have any advice?
Thank you!

[Anonymous]

My kid's breath holding phase didn't last that long.

Maybe a few months? It was scary the first few times but I pretty quickly got in the habit of picking him up and moving him someplace soft, (e.g. on a bed, or just holding him). There was always enough warning time to avoid a fall.

We did not sleep train during that time period.